All of Me: How I Learned to Live with the Many Personalities Sharing My Body

by Kim Noble

$23.99

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Author: Kim Noble

Publisher: Chicago Review Press

Paperback:
ISBN 10: 1613744706
ISBN 13: 978-1613744703

Taking the reader through an extraordinary world where the very nature of reality is different, this personal narrative tells the story of one woman’s terrifying battle to understand her own mind. From the desperate struggle to win back the child she loves to the courage and commitment needed to make sense of her life, this account recalls Kim Noble's many years in and out of mental institutions and various diagnoses until finally being appropriately diagnosed with dissociative identity disorder (DID). Described as a creative way some minds cope with unbearable pain, DID causes Kim's body to play host to more than 20 different personalities—from a little boy who speaks only Latin and an elective mute to a gay man and an anorexic teenager. Sometimes funny and ultimately uplifting, this brave illumination of the links and intersections between memory, mental illness, and creativity offers a glimpse into the mind of someone with DID and helps readers understand the confusion, frustration, and everyday difficulties in living with this disorder.

From

If two’s company and three’s a crowd, what’s a hundred? Mayhem. In her astonishingly understated biography of life with dissociative identity disorder (DID), Noble tells a few of the more than 100 stories of her life. Born south of London to working-class parents who could not afford proper child care, Kim was left with unfit caregivers who repeatedly and brutally abused her. She gained a reputation as a chronic liar and a discipline problem of the first order. For Kim, life was a dizzying wheel of inexplicable mysteries as personalities would waltz into and out of her interior life, each making his or her own changes and keeping them a secret from the others. Even the child Kim had was news to other personalities years after her birth. Perhaps most surprising of all is that Kim (who prefers to be known as Patricia, the currently dominant personality) lives a normal life with her 14-year-old daughter. This is the best multiple-personality biography in a long time. --Donna Chavez

Review

"Though I cannot even begin to imagine horrors Kim faced as a child, I am struck that neither the abuse nor its devastating consequences have destroyed this woman's spirit, humor, or capacity to love. [S]he is one terrible, exquisite, and beautiful work of art." —Independent

"[A] fascinating, moving, and frequently funny life story; we couldn't put it down." —Sheerluxe.com

"Kim Noble is the . . . gold standard for the extreme end of dissociative identity disorder." —John Morton, fellow of the Royal Society and professor at the Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience at the University of London

“A remarkable portrait of a fractured world slowly pieced together by a tenacious set of people.” —Publishers Weekly

"This is the best multiple personality biography in a long time." —Booklist

“[A] powerful memoir . . . deeply moving.” —Kirkus Reviews

About the Author

Kim Noble is an artist whose work has been exhibited around the world. She appeared on the Oprah Winfrey Show in October 2010 to discuss the disorder.

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Dissociative Disorders

All of Me: How I Learned to Live with the Many Personalities Sharing My Body